by Terry Morgan
"Now, Mr. Kerkman. Like any good bank Puff needs security when it hands out money. Your 12,480 Euros is not a free gift, Mr. Kerkman. If necessary—but only if it becomes necessary—documents will be drawn up to show you have only borrowed this money from a Zurich finance company and are due to repay it at the normal bank lending rates plus seventeen percent. By tomorrow you will owe Puff in Zurich 250 Euros in setting up charges alone. But you do not need to worry about paying this at present.
"You will pay it off by cooperating with Guido and our other Members and adding to your credit score. Oh, it is such good fun once you become used to it, but it is easy to become addicted. To be addicted is not good. And it is also very difficult to explain to anyone how it works. But no one will because we are all beneficiaries. And, anyway, our Members have influence. Some of them have great power as well as influence, Mr. Kerkman.
"But provided you are a very good boy and do not tell tales or do anything that contravenes the conditions I warned about the last time you were here, Puff will, one day, remove all traces of a loan—in a puff, so to say—and you will retain your accumulated credit. Do you follow me? Some people are now very wealthy, Mr. Kerkman. One or two are multi-millionaires…Now, do you understand all that I have told you?…I'm waiting."
"Yes."
"Good. Now, let us put the financial conditions to one side for the moment and discuss private matters. It is quite obvious that you must not talk about this to anyone. Not even Mr. Eischmann, do you understand? Mr. Eischmann is a very senior Member of the club. He has no wish to know details of what you do or what you will be told to do. He is a busy man and does not have time to concern himself with day-to-day officialdom. But he will call on you sometimes with his own code that is similar to yours. You will then do as you are told—won't you? Won't you?"
"Yes."
"And one other thing…" Guido's boyish voice from the blank screen paused. "This is very important but I hate discussing matters of a sexual nature. I find the subject quite distasteful. It is not human to do things like that. It is much more suited to pigs and dogs, don't you think. But rumor has it that you have had, what shall we say, an intimate relationship with another member of staff. This is very bad practice particularly as the lady concerned is so highly thought of. Katrine is a very nice lady and very innocent. She does not belong to the club but we want her to stay in her position for as long as possible, so do not upset her, Mr. Kerkman. Leave her alone, OK? She must not leave. She must not know anything. If she does, then…well, accidents happen to all of us. Puff has very long arms, much longer than mine."
What followed was a short but chilling giggle. And then: "You can leave now, Mr. Kerkman. Look on this as an exciting, once in a lifetime opportunity and wait for more instructions."
Jan, sweating and bewildered by what was happening continued to sit. All he had said throughout was "yes," but there were a hundred questions and he really had no wish to be involved. He took a deep breath. "I have some questions. Who should I ask?"
"Meee," came the shrill answer. "You ask meee. But not now. I am too busy."
"So how, when?"
"The same way you received the notice to attend your training course."
Jan thought for a moment. "It was a man with a dog."
"Yes, the man with the dog is a local celebrity near where you work, Mr. Kerkman. You are not the only one who has met him, you know. You have been given a very special and important job but there are others who receive just small tokens of appreciation now and again. Ibrahim is a refugee from Somalia. He is blind and so we supplied him with his dog as his eyes. That is our charitable nature but, also, he cannot see who he is meeting. But have pity on Ibrahim, Mr. Kerkman. Everyone needs to earn their daily bread in different ways. Ibrahim is a messenger. He gives and he takes. Trust him. Now, I must depart. I have important things to attend to. The door is open. Switch off the lights before you leave, please."
Chapter Thirty-Four
"WELL, DO YOU look at that—the first time I’ve seen you in a vertical position."
Jim's clean, blue pajamas contrasted starkly with the brown, stick-like arms protruding from the short sleeves. He was sitting in a chair next to his bed when Tom Hanrahan arrived the following afternoon but pushed himself up, walked the two steps to take the outstretched hand and tried to smile. "Good afternoon. The doctor said I should stay for another day. Unless I have another experience similar to the one at Lek's cafe then there is no reason to detain me, but I need to take some medication daily."
Jim returned to his chair and Tom sat on the other side of the bed in a white tee shirt with ‘O'Sullivan's’ emblazoned in green across the front. "I brought you this," he said handing over a paper bag. "But don't tell the doctor."
Jim looked inside and pulled out a bottle of Irish whiskey. "Thank you."
"From the airport and to remind myself of my local back home."
"And where, precisely, is home?" Jim asked.
What followed was Tom's family history, where he lived, three grown-up children living away and the death a year ago of his wife, Maeve. It ended with a phrase Jim decided he would always remember. "Life can be a bloody depressing way to spend your time…you know what I mean, Jim?"
Jim had nodded. "Life is not supposed to be easy. You only get one go at it, it's not a rehearsal, there's no script and circumstances play odd tricks."
A nurse brought iced lemon tea and the conversation edged forward until Tom asked: "So what will you do when you get out of here, Jim?"
"More to the point, what will you do? Write your story?"
"There is no story. I found you. Nothing more to be said."
"Hmm. That's utter nonsense. I suspect your dismissal had nothing to do with a refusal to obey instructions or striking a fellow reporter, Tom Hanrahan. You were probably dismissed for total incompetence. Of course there's a story. There's always a story for a good reporter. You could even invent one—others would. A few quotes, a few misquotes, a nice description of my swarthy looks, say you found me so drunk somewhere that I admitted who I was and that I was running a brothel in Bangkok. Use your imagination for goodness sake. Photograph me and do a nice Photoshop retouch showing me in the clutches of a Thai bar girl. You can't lose. You could do it. You've got a decent way with the spoken word if not the written one."
"That's just it, Jim. I can't. I need to report truth—no frills, no opinions, just facts. I started out wanting to do investigative reporting but never got the chance."
"Then start now. There's one hell of a story I can give you. What's more it's unfolding as we speak—which reminds me to check my emails—urgently. I should have been doing that two days ago at Lek's cafe but some blighter had taken my corner table and I wasn't feeling quite myself that morning."
Tom raised his gray to auburn eyebrows and saw something in Jim's eyes—alertness, hardness, intensity, seriousness. Jim Smith was on to something. The bit was still gripped firmly between his teeth, held fast by the same utter determination that had always characterized him. So what was he up to? Appearances apart, he hadn't changed much. He watched Jim's lean form get up and walk slowly across the room in the blue pajamas. At the window he looked out onto the hospital grounds.
"I intend to return to England," he said with his back to Tom. "At least, for a while. There are things I need to sort out and other matters that are coming to a head. And…" he stopped himself. "Let's walk outside. The garden looks good and it's cooler now."
They walked along a stretch of corridor and through a double glass door leading onto a stone courtyard and then a lawn. For several minutes, Jim sauntered around talking quietly, almost incoherently. Tom followed, trying to hear but increasingly aware that Jim was actually talking to himself. Behind a clump of Manila palms, was an ornamental pond with water lilies. The water shimmered in the low, early evening sun. Jim, barefoot, sat down, crossed his legs and put his hands together in his lap. Tom also sat down, clumsily, his legs, feet and white trainers ou
tstretched before him. The red water lily flowers were closing up.
“I must paint them," Jim nodded.
"You paint, Jim?"
"A little," he frowned and squeezed his eyelids together. Time, he felt, was running out. He wanted his youth back again. Big ambitions were behind him, but he had no wish to stop now just because he was getting older. It was the unfinished business. It was becoming urgent, taking far too long. And he had no wish to take medication every day for the rest of his life. Thoughts of Margaret then. Margaret liked gardens.
Tom watched Jim's moving lips and his closed eyes that flickered from point to point as if he was seeing things in his mind. His hair was a mess—long and straggling. His brown body, clad in the blue pajamas, looked thin, undernourished, like a prisoner from a concentration camp. He had changed—physically if not facially—since Tom had last seen him. But for the long hair and beard, he was almost unrecognizable. But it was definitely the same Jim, and Tom knew why he had come. Somewhere, he had the feeling that the man might appreciate a chance to chat, to talk openly. But there had been no sign of this or even a desire to glance at him when he had walked into the cafe. Jim had deliberately ignored him and possibly even hated him for the intrusion into his space. It was in the cafe that he had first seen Jim's lips moving, talking to himself. He had watched him fidgeting as though he had remembered something urgent he had to do. But then he had suddenly stood up, tottered and collapsed. But, as soon as Jim had fallen he, himself, had rushed over driven not by the feeling that it might lead to some form of rapport or even a good story but by a feeling of respect and compassion.
"Shall we go back now?" Jim broke the silence and stood up. Easily, Tom thought, as he himself struggled to unbend stiff legs.
"Jim," Tom said, holding onto Jim's thin, sinewy arm. "Excuse me for asking but did you never find yourself a new woman out here because I get the feeling you live alone. Sure 'tis a grand place for a romantic soul like yourself."
"Is that what I am? A romantic soul?"
"Sure it is. I see it in your eyes. You see beauty and color and you say you’re an artist. It's a fine talent to have but don’t you feel a need for someone to share it with?"
Jim looked away, conscious that the question struck surprisingly close to what he had just been thinking, but he kept walking. "I left a woman behind in England," he said.
"Sure you could start again."
"Look at me, Tom. What woman in her right mind would even want to be seen talking to, let alone living with, a man like me—wearing blue pajamas as well."
"Some women would appreciate the man inside the pajamas, Jim."
"Mmm. Perhaps the man inside is as much of a mess as the man outside."
"I don't think so. In fact I'm damned sure that's complete and utter nonsense if you don't mind me saying so."
Jim was breathing hard, his chest heaving.
"So when was the last liaison with a woman then, Jim?"
"Are you interviewing me, you Irish rascal?" There was a pause. "During a short-lived but intense relationship with Tiger beer. I woke up one morning and there she was. I was in the middle of sorting out certain, private matters but we were together off and on for four long months. For me it was an intense and highly enlightening time. I learned a lot about life, about living, about myself. I discovered a side to my own character that had been completely hidden. I suppose I learned the basis of pure Buddhism, Buddhism without the painted concrete images and the gaudy temples that sometimes reminds me too much of the Catholic Church. I have always been frugal and money has never meant much to me other than as a measure of commercial acumen. So, having sorted out my main financial commitments back in England I learned how to live from day to day on a shoestring of a budget.
“In fact I bought the house I now live in, and the small plot of surrounding land, to give to her and her young daughter Oy who was just three at the time we met. Noy was thirty-six. I was sixty-something and a lot better looking and fitter than I am now. It seems such a long time ago."
"So what happened, Jim?"
"I saw them off on a bus going to Kanchanaburi to see Noy's parents. I waved them goodbye through the bus window. They both smiled and waved back at me. It was raining heavily. There was a terrible road accident and they were both killed." Jim sniffed. "So there, my Irish friend, you have another long, true, interesting and ultimately heart-rending story that I could elaborate on. Neither would it need any of the fabrication you apparently detest."
Then he walked away, still breathing heavily.
Chapter Thirty-Five
"I HAVE NO idea where he is."
It was late evening and Jan had phoned Jonathan to check if Jim had been in touch. Jan had felt increasingly nervous since his Sunday experience in Delft but they had both known there would be risks. It was the scale and sophistication and now the direct involvement that was worrying Jan. And the solution and a way of extricating himself seemed further away than ever.
Jan wanted to talk, but Jonathan was sitting, for the first time in a week, trying to watch TV with Claire. Claire was listening intently to Jonathan's side of the conversation.
"I see now that Guido's Puff and Slush schemes are just the ingenious mechanisms to hack into sites, extract and move money and then hide the gaps in the accounts that that generates," Jan was saying. "It's very clever. But I'm in this up to my neck now, Jon. Jesus knows how I'm going to get out of it. Even if I run, report it somewhere and ask for some sort of protection I genuinely fear for my parents, my sister, for Katrine. This Italian guy Guido is sinister. He makes me nervous just hearing his voice. I wake up at night thinking I can hear him. Who is he? Where is he? Is he the top man or just the technical brains? Is he part of a bigger organization? And where does Eischmann fit into this? Is Eischmann just on the take or is he a ringleader, as high up the chain as or higher than Guido?"
"Puff and Slush are the mechanisms—the technology side that Jim used to talk about," replied Jonathan, hoping that Claire would rapidly lose the plot and, with it, her interest. "But the organization itself has infiltrated companies, charities, government departments—organizations that can legitimately bid for funds—to influence them and divert funds to whoever they decide? A charity leader, a government official, a politician, a Minister, a President."
Jan agreed. "And it makes sense to go a step further and set up fictitious bodies specifically to bid for funds—targeting pots of money already ring-fenced, earmarked for humanitarian aid, economic support, social projects, healthcare, education. That, we know, is what Jim believes because he had the personal experience. They could be pocketing billions. But I think even Jim would be taken aback by Puff and Slush."
***
In Thailand, Jim had just made a crucial decision.
"I would like to invite you to my house, Tom. There are things I'd like to discuss."
Tom had imagined a modern dwelling, a bungalow perhaps, on the outskirts of Kanchanaburi—two or three bedrooms, en-suite, a kitchen, flower beds, a lawn. He did not expect the bike ride to take almost an hour. They stopped twice—once to buy iced coconut, the second time to buy clear soup, sausages, rice and a meat and chilli dish from a roadside stall—all packed into clear plastic bags tied with elastic bands. By the time Jim suddenly turned off down a dirt track and announced, "We're here," the sun was sinking behind trees and the distant hills.
Tom's concerns then rose.
In one corner of a small, grassy clearing liberally scattered with shrubs, a forlorn banana tree and a small patch of dry looking vegetables, was a rough-looking wooden structure built about a meter or so above the ground. A few wooden steps led to a platform partly sheltered by an overhanging corrugated roof. "Home," Jim announced cheerfully as he dismounted.
So started Tom's night at Jim's house. Where he imagined it might be in the suburbs, it was on the edge of the jungle, surrounded by night-time insect and other noises. When he thought it would be modern, it was old, wooden and ramshackle. If
he thought he might get offered a beer, he got rainwater from a huge clay pot and he was wrong when he thought he might get a bed and bathroom if he stayed the night. But it had electricity— a bare light bulb dangled above the wooden steps and a strip light hung by a cable inside. And it had a small refrigerator, albeit empty but for a few cartons of soya milk and a yellowing cabbage.
As Jim busied himself outside in the deepening gloom, Tom looked inside. It smelled smoky, dusty. The strip light showed a piece of gray netting hanging by strings from the ceiling in one dark corner, wooden shelves holding jars, cups and paint brushes, a cupboard with a few clothes hanging inside and a pile of stacked cardboard boxes, some tied with string. In the fourth corner was a bundle of plastic sheeting and a blue plastic pipe with a shower spray attachment lying across the floor.
They ate the contents of the plastic bags on Jim's veranda and nothing was said for a while. Eventually, Tom felt he needed to say something. "Well, Jim, I must say, this is a fine place for getting away from it all. You don't appear to have any neighbors to bother you."
Jim nodded. "You are thinking I must be mad to live here, is that right?"
"For sure, it had crossed my mind."
"But you don't ask me."
"OK. I ask you now, Jim. Why the bloody hell are you living in this place, miles from anywhere? I know why you left the UK, but why stay here. It's very—what shall I say?—basic." Tom flapped away another large, flying insect.
"There, perhaps, is part of your story, Tom."
The darkness was making it difficult for Tom to see Jim's face. He was sitting, cross-legged, staring out into the chirping, croaking blackness, sipping occasionally from a plastic mug of water. "Then tell me the story, Jim. If I don't like what I am hearing, I'll stop listening."
"Would you like a drop of the Irish whiskey with the water?"
